Gamification

Indirect Incentives: Good or Bad in Gamification?

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First things first, what do you think of the new blog theme? Playing with the Hueman theme to see how it goes. I have also removed a large number of poppy uppy things!

Recently I heard an interesting idea on how to indirectly incentivise employees to do a particular voluntary task. The plan was that every x percent of people who did the task would translate into a charitable donation from the company to a charity voted on by the employees.

My first thought was “great, they finally get that you should stop trying to incentive everything with competitions or gift vouchers!” However, after I thought some more, I began to feel that this was still a bad idea… Read More ...

1 element that makes Godus sticky, but suck as a game

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Concept4 1 element that makes Godus sticky but suck as a game

In this article I am discussing the iOS version of Godus

I love god games, games where you get to influence the development of a world. Sim City, Civilisation and of course Populous we all favourites as I grew up.

Now the original designer of Populous, Peter Moleneux, has given us a new vision of god games in the form of Godus. The story behind the development and the campaigns run to get it started are almost a “how to” of gamification really.

It started in around 2012 with the release of the iOS “game” Curiosity. This had people clicking on squares on a 3D cube to clear layers. All people were told was that the person who cleared the very last square would win a prize of a lifetime! Clearing cubes gave you coins. Coins could be used to buy better tools to clear squares more efficiently. There was also a series of in app purchases (IAPs) that allowed you to get access to these for real money. A few months later a chap called Bryan Hednerson opened the cube and discovered he would not only get a revenue share of a new game called Godus, but he would also be the main god of the game. Read More ...

4 tips for creating viral content #gamification #icebucketchallenge

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A couple of days ago I got nominated for the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge.  For those of you who don’t know what this is, it is a viral awareness campaign that has been knocking around the internet for a few weeks now. A person is challenged to pour a bucket of ice water over their head, film it and nominate others to do the same. If they don’t want to do that, they can donate to the ALS (or in the UK Motor Neurone Disease) charity.

The video above is my contribution.

This challenge has been massively successful, raising millions for the charities and also making millions aware of the disease. But what has made it such a success? Read More ...

[Updated] Defining fun – some research results

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UPDATED 27/08/2014

After a few more responses, I have realised I missed off Learning as a type of fun!!!

As many of you will have seen by now, I am running a short survey on what people find fun. So far I have had 155 results, for which I am truly grateful! Of course, I need more – so tell your friends, I am missing any answers at all from the 17 or younger age group!

However, I thought it would be fun to share some of the findings so far, show those of you that have answered so far that there is something happening with your answers. I have been categorising the answers into various types of fun, creating new types as I find answers that don’t fit into those I already have. So far this has given me 21 types of fun. Part of this process is to get your feedback on the types I have so far – are they all separate for example, or can I group a few. Also, can I group them generally beyond what I have already. I really need your feedback to help this process! Read More ...

Just rewarding activity is not gamification: stop it!

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I have promised in the past not to write about the dangers of extrinsic rewards anymore. However, can’t stand reading about gamification being a failure anymore, when the articles proclaiming this almost always start with “gamification is about awarding points, or physical rewards to people for doing dull tasks”.

No quoting from Dan Pink or Deci and Ryan this time, just facts based on experience.

If you offer a reward, especially a material reward that has value to people, you are setting yourself up for failure. Every time I have seen a ‘gamified’ campaign that offers someone like an iPad as a prize for participation, it has had problems. The worst culprit is when the prize is offered for nothing more than activity (so no actual creativity needed). Read More ...

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